


Away From Calamity

by Skeren



Category: Final Fantasy VII
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Arranged Marriage, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-24
Updated: 2016-02-24
Packaged: 2018-05-22 23:06:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,900
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6096969
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Skeren/pseuds/Skeren
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sephiroth has to decide how to feel about Vincent after finding this... contract.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Away From Calamity

**Author's Note:**

> Written May 2009.

The details in the papers weren’t clear, but the gist of the matter was. Before he was born, a woman named Lucretia Crescent had drawn up this marriage contract. It didn’t say anything along the lines of ‘if the child is a woman’ and it didn’t say anything about how old he was to be when it was set into effect. 

He’d found it when hunting for papers on something else entirely, in a man named Vincent Valentine’s file. 

He’d never heard from, nor seen the man in his life. 

But according to this certificate, he could be married to him. 

He hadn’t really cared about the man before he saw that, but it put an entirely new light on a few things. After all, that made the man his, didn’t it? Satisfied by that logic, he flipped back through the other papers for one that was relevant to this one. There it was.

Tranquilized stasis. 

Studying it for a moment, he debated if this was going to be worth it. He already had a headache, after all, and he’d only been here a day. He was also certain that Zack would just have to have an opinion, regardless.

What if the man was ugly? What if he wasn’t? Would he even be willing to sleep with someone who had been promised to a child? One not even born? After all, that was his signature. 

He studied the certificate again, looking over the fine details. Yes, it was an out. And his name was on it. He just had to put his signature on it to fully finalize everything. 

Then Shinra couldn’t claim him as dependent status and deny him the independent rights that many others had. 

Decided on his course of action, he turned and left the underground library, looking for where the man might be kept in stasis. If he wasn’t here it would put a severe damper on the entire matter, but if he was, he could decide then and there if he wanted to sign this paper. There were doors down here he’d ignored as unimportant, assuming them to be storage, but he hadn’t once warranted the idea that those things stored inside might be people.

He should have after what was above. 

Pushing into the one room that hadn’t been connected to the lab itself, and instead it connected at the dank hallway from the stairs, he decided to start there. He went through most of the closets in the lab portion before starting in on his papers and he certainly hadn’t found any bodies while he’d been doing it. 

There were boxes in the room, of course. He could call them coffins, but coffins only housed the dead, and that would put a severe damper on his plan, not to mention his mood, so he would rather not call them that. Satisfied with his logic, he moved to one of those lining the wall, and was displeased to find it locked. 

Apparently this was going to make his headache worse after all. _Apparently_ even an abomination like him couldn’t get anything in simple manner, even if it was to find another one. Glowering darkly at the locked box, he called up Masamune and cut into that section before just levering it out. There, no more lock. 

On opening it, however, he found that there was nothing within. 

Of course.

Considering this, he turned and looked at the other four in the room with a considering air. 

The person in question was someone who had had the power to take him from Hojo. 

What did Hojo do with people who did things he didn’t like?

He made an example of them. 

He should have thought it through before starting to frustrate himself. 

Moving to the box in the center of the room, he set about destroying the lock, then lifted the lid. 

And paused. 

Whoever Lucretia was, she certainly had good taste if this was the man she picked out for her offspring. 

Running considering eyes over the man’s figure as his even breathing held, he considered the hair and skin tone, then his attire. The golden gauntlet caught his attention, but he would deal with that later if he had to. It could be either prosthetic or decoration, and there was really no way to tell. 

Decided, he reached out, fully intending to confirm his rather risen hopes. Giving the man a firm shake after making sure the papers were down out of sight and his now free hand was on his blade... he waited.

And waited as only even breathing met his attempt at waking the man. 

This was getting annoying. 

Sighing, he tried the gentle approach again.

Still, nothing.

Obviously, something as gentle as that wasn’t going to counter whatever had him asleep. 

Turning over all his options, and looking over his items, left him with the obvious solution. He doubted the man would be at all happy with him when he woke, but he had a headache, he wanted to confirm this, and overall, he sincerely doubted the man would mind a bit of pain if he got to leave this place after that.

He certainly was always eager to leave the labs every time he had to go to them for any reason. 

Decided, he glanced to Masamune. No, definitely not. He eyed the man, then climbed up into the box so he was in a better position to pin his hands quickly, then slapped him. 

It would have been horribly embarrassing if he’d had to resort to hair pulling like a little girl. Thankfully, the little flash of pain jolted the man awake.

Finally. 

Flicking the blade around so it was between them as the man jerked upright, he shifted his weight on his knees to keep him from getting any further. 

He definitely had the man’s full attention from the looks of things... good. And the man had a fascinating color of eyes at that. Very good taste. “Vincent Valentine?”

The man, still obviously torn between confusion and caution of the blade close to his neck, eyed him. “...Yes. Why?”

He shifted back slightly, taking in the deeper than expected voice. Hmm. That was fine. When his movement didn’t jolt the other man into action, he carefully climbed out of the box, noting that the man wisely stayed still. Very good. 

As he didn’t answer, more focused on collecting his paperwork to dash a quick signature on it, the dark haired man twisted to eye what he was doing. “Who are you?”

”Your husband.” He put Masamune away then, unable to hold in his amusement at the confused, not to mention shocked, look that that answer garnered. Had the man forgotten?

“I’m sorry, but, what?” 

“Your husband.” He lifted the papers in his hands so that the man could finally see them. “As of this moment, as your signature appears to have already been on these for quite some time.”

“But I only... You’re Sephiroth.”

“Yes, I am.”

The man moved to turn, got caught because of the cloak he was wearing, which he had to pause to fight off, then looked at him more fully in confusion, now crouched so he could get out of the box. “But you’re a man.”

”I’d noticed that yes.” Maybe Lucretia had focused more on strength than intelligence in her choice? Or perhaps just prettiness?

“A contract like that isn’t binding if the parties are both the same gender.”

“Yes, it is. There’s no ban on it, and these contracts stipulate nothing to do with gender. Lucretia apparently was quite thorough. Did you not read her work?”

“You call her Lucretia?” Again the man seemed at a loss, and he took a slight amount of pity on him. After all, he had just woken, and later he would have to countenance Zack. Also, he had too much of a headache to linger here any longer. He wanted food and sleep. 

“Of course I do, that’s the woman’s name isn’t it? Out of that, this is hardly the place to get to know each other.”

“You don’t call her mother?”

That paused him mid-reach, between the sharp spike in his headache and confusion he had to still. “Why would I?”

“If you’re Sephiroth, then Lucretia is your mother.”

”No, my mother’s name is Jenova.”

The man scowled, getting out of the box with a hand on the side and a careful hop so he didn’t land on him once he was out. “No, it isn’t. I expect Hojo told you that, didn’t he?”

“Yes?”

Confused as to when he’d lost control of the situation, he blinked at the pale fingers curled around his wrist to tug him towards the entrance of the room, noting that the man was even paler than _he_ was. “Of course he would. The man is obsessed. Jenova isn’t your mother. I _knew_ your mother and she was a lovely woman. Though I’ll admit you look like Jenova, genetic tampering can do that to a boy.”

He didn’t know whether to agree or not, and as the man turned to head for the stairs as soon as they were out of the room, he had to at least concede that the man knew where he was going. “And how are you so sure about that? Do you have proof?”

“Jenova is a corpse that is likely still encased in crystal. Lucretia had second thoughts and had those papers done up for her unborn child so at least the child, who at the time we were hoping would be a girl, could grow up in a decent home. As Hojo is your father, there was little else she could do without outright alerting him. One person can’t sign away anyone but their own children in marriage you know, unless that’s changed as well in the last... how old are you?”

“Twenty-five.”

“Last twenty-five years. I’m going to look those back over once we’re upstairs. I assume you’re staying in the mansion?”

“No, the inn in town.”

“Why?”

“Because that’s where we have board?”

“I meant, why don’t you live here?” Red eyes looked to him critically, and he finally tugged his hand free of the light insistent grip. He could walk on his own. 

“I’m a SOLDIER, why would I?”

“A soldier.”

He caught the lack of inflection. “SOLDIER. It’s a division of specially enhanced troops.”

There was a grimace in answer to that, but he felt more steady about all this as he mounted the stairs. “So you’re often away. Where do you live then?”

“Midgar.” He looked to the man and shook his head. “But we’re going to the hotel. You need to meet my second in command in any case.”

“Why?” He could tell the older man was getting frustrated with his lack of knowledge.

“Because we’ve been lovers for well over a year now and as such he deserves to meet my husband.”

He didn’t know why the man’s flummoxed expression pleased him as much as it did... but it helped improve his mood. 

He was sure his mood would be even better once he presented the man to Zack. After all, Zack was the master of confusion, and positive confusion in someone else was infinitely better than betrayed confusion as he’d been feeling from the moment he’d set foot in the reactor that morning.


End file.
